The celebrated 1917 work “On Growth and Form” of D'Arcy W. Thompson has established a landmark for mathematical biology, introducing new perspectives of study and research in biology, providing mathematical methods to morphology of biological systems. In this brief historical essay, we recall the novelties and relevance of the work from a retrospective stance, above all pointing out the crucial role played by it in the dawning of epigenetic standpoint. The role of underlying epigenetic processes in generation of biological forms via similarity transformations is analyzed within the framework of D'Arcy Thompson. The significance of D'Arcy Thompson as a predecessor of the relational biology and of the epigenetic concepts of evolution is discussed.

D'Arcy W. Thompson 1917 年著名的著作《论生长与形式》为数学生物学树立了里程碑，引入了生物学研究的新视角，为生物系统的形态学提供了数学方法。在这篇简短的历史文章中，我们从回顾的角度回顾了这项工作的新颖性和相关性，最重要的是指出它在表观遗传学观点的曙光中发挥的关键作用。在 D'Arcy Thompson 的框架内分析了潜在的表观遗传过程在通过相似性转换产生生物形式中的作用。讨论了达西汤普森作为关系生物学和进化的表观遗传概念的前身的重要性。